It’s the 1950s again! Or is it the 60s? Or the 80s? It’s hard to tell. Violent Hearts, the debut album from Vancouver three-piece Shimmering Stars, is an album unapologetically moored in the past – not any specific past, though, or any…
Category: Reviews
Album | Stealing Sheep – I Am The Rain
Here in Somerset we have a long founded tradition, one that’s forged a rite of passage for many a disaffected reprobate. Sheep tossing. Without the wit to steal one of these roaming clouds, but the itch to do something, as…
Album | The Ridges – The Ridges
The Ridges call their music “orchestral folk rock”, and they’d very much like you to believe that that’s true. The opening track on their self-titled mini-album (as an aside, what makes a five track mini-album different to an EP? Answers…
Kill It Kid – Feet Fall Heavy
I’ll admit I’ve had a habit, purely on the basis of their name, of getting Kill It Kid confused with To Kill A King. Talk of killing things starting with ‘k’ and links to Communion Records were enough to leave…
Live | Petra Jean Phillipson @ St Pancras Old Church
Petra Jean Phillipson’s MySpace page boldly states: ‘Notes On Love… is NOT for AIRHEADS’. If this first, experimental yet accessible, album wasn’t for airheads then second offering, Notes on Death, is NOT for anyone who believes songs should have such…
Live | Slow Club @ Shepherds Bush Empire
How frustrating it must be to spend all your energy and creativity making a debut album that everybody loves, only to be labelled as something you never wanted to be. Slow Club managed to win hordes of wonderful fans thanks…
Album | Wilco – The Whole Love
Wilco know us too well. They know what questions we’re asking as we slot the Whole Love into the cd player. Chief among them is, as ever, ‘what kind of band are Wilco this time?’. After the killer one-two that…
Live | Spiers & Boden, Cambridge
Fondly known as one of the hardest working duos in the folk music world, John Spiers and Jon Boden were the hit of this year’s Cambridge Folk Festival. Their bombastic 11-piece big band Bellowhead played a storming set in the main…
Live | Treetop Flyers @ Hoxton Bar and Kitchen
Treetop Flyers are in many ways the quintessential band to have emerged from the collaborative Communion stable, and their old-time country courts ever increasing attention and buzz. At the launch of not-so-new single ‘It’s About Time’, the band that seems…
Festival | Bestival 2011
Sparky electro-pop and dance were more dominant than folk at this year’s Bestival, but it’s a cheerful mish-mash where sensitive strumming acts are welcomed (as long as they’re not upset by a soft background thud of drum and bass, as…